Becca's Mom (Laura Lee) and I had a splendid visit with Becca and John for two weeks where we got to observe the two of them together with Chaco in their natural habitat.
The back story is that Becca and John finished their summer photojournalism expedition with renowned conservationist, Mike Fay, in late September. In this expedition, they had the incredible opportunity to capture 11 terra-bytes (that is a lot of bytes) of high resolution footage of the fragile salmon spawning ecosystem of the far Pacific Northwest. They filmed bears, carribou, sheep, mosquitos, and other indigenous species doing what they do when no one is looking.
As they were finishing up their assignment, LL and I were hanging out with friends in Napa, California, which is just around the corner from Ketchikan, Alaska, so we went to join them. We signed on as crew for a portion of Halcyon's 800+ mile southerly transit to Portland, or Seattle, or really anyplace that is not Alaska. Summer has a habit of turning directly into winter in this part of the world and early October is predictably a time of unrelenting storm systems. Most cruisers who are going to leave for the winter had already left when we arrived. We were reminded of this fact when incredulous friends of theirs said: "What? You are still here??".So we sailed with them for 370 miles down coast to their old stomping grounds in Bella Bella, BC. Here, we disembarked and departed for Richmond just as a serious series of storms (65 mph winds, whew!) pinned them to the dock for over a week.
On our journey down the coast, we got a taste of rough weather on the front and the back end, but truly in between the weather could not have been more hospitable. Winds blew from every direction, but rarely at the same time. We had sun, which was a bit disorienting to John, I think. Temperatures were in the 30s at night as we were cozy around the cabin heater, and reached the high 50s a few times. John went barefoot on the boat no matter how raw the conditions; yet he gets pneumonia in Mexico where the temperature never dropped below 70. Go figure.
It is clear Becca and John's (and Chaco's) natural habitat is unspoiled coastal waters. They are accomplished racing and cruising sailors that have easily taken to the live aboard lifestyle. Couple this with the aptitude and intense interest in wilderness photography and conservation and you have a logical self selection of coastal wilderness for their home for the past 15 months.
We got a glimpse into this world on our visit.
The shoreline from Ketchikan south on one of the inside passages or outside in the Pacific is devoid of development, for now. The many salmon streams are largely unaffected by industrial waste or over zealous logging, for now. Accordingly, the wildlife and marine life is abundant, for now.
On our transit, we witnessed 30+ humpbacks, a huge sea lion herd, seals, porpoise, dolphins surfing our bow, at least 100 eagles (I finally just stopped looking up), and proximate evidence of grizzlies. We looked for coastal wolves for two solid weeks and heard them baying a few times, but it was disappointing that we never saw them. Then, five minutes from wheels up to Richmond four of them pranced across the tarmac at the Bella Bella airport. What we did not see was any other people or boats in any of our anchorages and only rarely did we see any boats while underway. That is mostly a tribute to the lateness of the season as these waters would ordinarily be well traveled.
We caught, and ate, Dungeness crabs, northwest clams, rockfish, halibut, perch, and a huge lingcod while throwing back three times what we kept. We caught, and did not eat, sea cucumbers, huge red jelly fish with 10 foot tentacles, spiny crabs and 16 leg starfish. We drank a case of wine that we brought with us from Napa, so I may be confusing what we ate and what we didn't eat.Becca and John were the co-captains and Laura Lee and I were clearly the crew. They worked so well as a team, even in stressful conditions, and were always respectful of each other's talents and judgment. I can't express how gratifying it feels to teach a daughter to sail at age 5 and 20+ years later see how much she has learned.
Halcyon is their home and they were gracious hosts.
We hope they will have us back sometime.
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